Laura Rowan | The Gold Standard for Internal Work and Education
Show Notes:
The Gold Standard for Pelvic Health Education: Are We Training Therapists the Right Way?
Internal pelvic health work can be incredibly valuable – but are we truly teaching clinicians how to do it safely, skillfully, and effectively?
In this candid conversation, Lynn Schulte, PT, and Laura Rowan, OT, challenge the way pelvic health clinicians are being trained and explore what the gold standard for intravaginal education should really look like.
In this episode, we explore:
- What success with internal work looks like
- The importance of trauma-informed education and true consent
- The must-haves in intravaginal education that every practitioner needs
- Why knowing how to assess is only half the equation
- What to treat beyond the pelvic floor muscles
- How to turn clients from passive recipients to active participants in their treatment
The Clinical Takeaway
Internal work is a tool – not the entire treatment.
The real skill is knowing when to use it, how to create safety, how to interpret what you find, and how to turn those findings into effective treatment.
If you’ve ever taken a pelvic health course and thought, “I know how to assess it…but what do I actually DO with it?” – this episode is for you.
Press play and rethink what is needed to support a gold standard in pelvic health education.
About the speaker
Laura Rowan, OT/L, is a Pelvic Health Occupational Therapist, educator, mentor, and advocate dedicated to advancing Occupational Therapy and expanding access to pelvic health care.
As founder of Essential Pelvic Health, LLC, an Upstate New York pelvic health practice, Laura takes an innovative, collaborative, whole-person approach to helping people of all gender identities experiencing persistent pelvic pain and bladder, bowel, or sexual dysfunction return to meaningful activities.
Laura also advances the field through clinician education, mentorship, and advocacy. Essential Pelvic Health offers continuing education courses, including PR-MATT and Cr-MATT, as well as workshops, free resources, and EPH Mentor Creative, a mentorship community supporting ongoing professional growth.
Speaker’s Website: https://www.essentialpelvichealth.com/
Speaker’s Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/27VFGUfoj3XbVtXMZ8LbME
Essential Pelvic Health Education FB group: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/1DMxYG7U8y/
Love Dr. Rachael! She is such a gem in the Metro Detroit area. She was my pelvic floor PT during my first pregnancy and postpartum and inspired me to pursue pelvic health certification (coming from an Ortho PT clinic). I’m now working through Holistic Treatment of the Pregnant and Postpartum Body.
Thank you so much for this presentation…I am an osteopath and also trained in SER (love love Upledger!)…the piece about ‘freeze’ related to transgenerational trauma was very informative and a reminder to look further…I have had a client who lost a baby and when I treated her she felt she needed to give birth to this child…and then went back several lives and saw that she had also lost a baby many lives prior! This relieved her of some stress…so every piece of the puzzle counts…keep the nuggets coming, so appreciative! Best, Judith
Great interview, Lynn and Susanne, for pushing us beyond “hands on, hands in”, confirming our need as therapists, for wide, grounded personal presence for our clients to feel safe and then willing to bring forth those physical/emotional/transgenerational, traumas/beliefs that lead to more complete healing and return to function. Appreciate the shout out, and listened delightfully to two of my favorite teachers and mentors. All of this was gold!